Phoenix Music Blog

As we all prepare to say goodbye to the Modified Arts as we have come to know it and wait for downtown to be ovah, we can't help but think of all the other amazing venues we have loved and lost in the Valley. Whether they were small and seedy or big with a bangin' sound system, there were several venues that housed some uber nostalgic moments for us as desert rats. Here's our tribute to those places that rocked us til they shut their doors for good.

The Web Theatre

Heather Hoch

​What it was: A fun place to go to a ska show, for sure. Web was primly located right off Van Buren and 6th Street. The place really had great sound and acoustics, and we can remember skanking the night away there on a few occasions.

What it is: The venue is now a stately medical school building for the University of Arizona's Phoenix campus. Sure, it's pretty, but we miss the jams.

Most Nostalgic Moment: We've heard a story about the singer from a popular local indie band being accosted by Juggalos in the early 2000s while trying to get home after school. We won't name names but, trust us, it's funny to imagine.

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Every zombie walk and kitschy zombie indie comedy is milking the zombiemania cash cow. However, the films that paved the way still get little recognition, which is a darn shame.

These films explore just what a human can do under apocalyptic circumstances and how far people will go to survive. Also, they're really gory and just plain fun to watch. We intend to right the injustices served to these overlooked classics, and with that, we proudly present the top underrated zombie films list.

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Yes, that's right, doors to Arizona Fall Frenzy, probably the biggest music festival Arizona has ever hosted, open in 30 hours. Sure, the lineup is not what a lot of people I know were hoping for -- and I, myself, had to put a little effort in to thinking of five sets I called "must sees" in this week's issue -- but this is still pretty huge. Right?

Here's a list of five things I'm looking forward to, and five things I'm not looking forward to when the gates come bursting open with starry-eyed women fighting for position to moon over Gavin Rossdale, Jason Mraz and Rob Thomas.

Bob Dylan's canceled show in Glendale tonight got us thinking about his son, Jakob Dylan, who is still young and fit enough to perform in just over 100 degree weather. He's less at risk for heatstroke, sure, but, of course, the number of folks who will shell out cash to see Jake is definitely not in the same ballpark as the those who would see Daddy Bobby perform.

That's kind of a trend, actually. Many children grow up to follow in their parents' footsteps, and the world of music is no different. Unfortunately, from what we found, few of them are able to get to the same level their 'rents did. Some come pretty close though. Here's our list of the top ten musicians spawned from other musicians.

In honor of The Bad Boys from Boston gracing the stage at Cricket Pavillion this evening, we've compiled a top ten list of Aerosmith's less-than-flattering moments. Sorry, no Joe Perry Solo album, here.

10. Liv Tyler as a Sex Symbol

Liv and Daddy Steven Tyler

Little Liv (Who was only 16 at the time) was cast as a rambunctiously risque schoolgirl in Aerosmith's 1994 music video, "Crazy." The producers apparently had no knowledge that Liv was Steven's daughter. 

9. "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing," A.K.A That God awful song from the equally as God awful film, Armageddon

Despite the song being a Billboard Hot 100 number one hit, it wasn't written by the band and was meant for Celine Dion. Enough said.​

Continue reading " Aerosmith's Ten Worst Moments"...

Tags: Aerosmith, Cricket Wireless Pavillion, Guitar Hero

1. You know what I've always hated? Hearing MJ described as "the self-proclaimed King of Pop." First, I don't think it's appropriately respectful of the man who wrote Thriller; second, as far as I know, it's totally inaccurate, as I've never heard Jackson refer to himself as the "King of Pop" and, even if he did, he was only using an honorific given to him by Liz Taylor. Look, folks, if Jackson was dubbed "The King" by Cleopatra herself, who are we to question it?

2. Oh, The Onion, you're always as prophetic as you are hilarious.

3. Thought from a co-worker who wishes to remain anonymous: "It's a lot like when grandma in hospice dies. He's in a better place right now."

Amazon takes their shot at indie rock's 100 greatest albums

The fine folks over at amazon.com decided that the time was ripe to assemble a list of the best indie rock albums of all time. Indie rock is a genre either really easy to define or kind of confusing to define, but that sentiment did not hold back amazon.com as their staff writers compiled their massive list. It is a sight to behold and it includes some impressive (and not so impressive) albums. Revel in the glory of the list after the jump.

Yes, you silly monkey, throw it already

On this week 15 years ago, East Bay punk stalwarts Green Day released their career-defining album, Dookie. Yeah, I said career-defining. Say what you will about American Idiot and what it did for the band (skyrocketing them into mega-stardom), but Green Day wouldn't even have had a chance to record that album without first unleashing Dookie onto the masses. The album, Green Day's third, sold 15 million copies worldwide and officially transformed the band into "sellouts" in the eyes of many smelly, dreadlocked, leather-wearing punk kids. While that may be true, the band can't be at fault for wanting to work with producer Rob Cavallo, the man responsible for launching Green Day into America's conscience. Dookie was, and still is, an amazingly tight, cohesive album. After recently giving it a listen, all those fuzzy memories still remain, and I still know all the lyrics to "Longview," "When I Come Around," and "Basket Case." Come, relive the glory with me as I explain why Dookie is one of, if not the best, punk/alternative rock albums of the '90s.

Is this what you think of the American public, Pepsi?

There were some truly awful ads on during yesterday's insanely competitive Super Bowl. The economy is changing, America is changing, and the past two Super Bowls have been some of the best games in Super Bowl history. I remember watching some Super Bowls that were atrocious, lopsided affairs that were over by halftime. It didn't matter for me, though -- I was much younger and enjoyed the commercials more than anything. Advertisements have become more and more clever over the years, and even though I despise most commercials, some of them are unique, clever and fun to watch. Pepsi, on the other hand, produces commercials that are manipulative, boring and completely hackneyed. They befuddled me and the majority of those watching the game with me with their most recent effort, "Refresh Anthem." A further examination of the commercial, and the video itself, follows after the jump.

On March 31, metal band Queensrÿche will release a concept record titled American Soldier. The band's 1988 album, Operation: Mindcrime, was also a concept record, but that concept was about a junkie who's brainwashed into becoming an assassin for an underground criminal organization, whereas American Soldier's concept follows the life of a soldier in the Iraq war.

Both of those storylines are good, but the world's seen no shortage of concept albums over the past four decades. In anticipation of Queensrÿche's upcoming new album, we take a look at our picks for the "Top 10 Concept Albums of All-Time," ordered from least to most outstanding, with apologies to Iron Maiden's Seventh Son of a Seventh Son and Styx's Kilroy Was Here for just barely missing the list.

10. The Mars Volta, De-Loused in the Comatorium (2003). This conceptual odyssey from prog rock purveyors The Mars Volta follows the story of a man named Cerpin Taxt, who fails to kill himself with a morphine and rat poison cocktail, and instead lapses into a week-long, vision-laden coma.

9. My Chemical Romance, The Black Parade (2006). This concept record about a man dying of cancer (known only as "The Patient") and his reflections on life is a surprisingly upbeat, rock-out journey.

8. Genesis, The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway (1974). Genesis' double-concept record (and the last to feature Peter Gabriel on vocals) tells the story of a young Puerto Rican hood named Rael, who travels to the nightmarish bowels of New York City to rescue his brother.

Not as excited as this dude for Sunday? No worries, I'm not, either.

If you're anything like me (and I recognize that most Arizonans--nay, most Americans--are not), you don't get football.

The overall appeal, the rules, the weird players-slapping-each-other-on-the-ass thing--it's all a bit baffling. But, there are a surprisingly large contingent of us who still attend Super Bowl parties every year for two overwhelming reasons: the food and the beer. If there were ever two more noble reasons to attend an event you wouldn't otherwise be caught dead near, those are the two. But food and beer alone cannot sustain someone for four-ish hours while everyone else is glued to the television. Here are some other Super Bowl party activities for those who would rather skin a pig than watch a pigskin:

The PovertyNeck Hillbillies are the official band of the Pittsburgh Steelers -- yes, really.

Last week we brought you a debate over the best Arizona musicians of all time after Arizona Premiere Living put out a list that includes Mr. Mister but not Stevie Nicks. Turns out, there are so many great musicians from Arizona it's impossible to fit them all on to a top 10 list.

With the Arizona Cardinals facing the Pittsburgh Steelers this weekend we decided to make a list of the 10 best musical acts from the Steel City. Spoiler alert: We didn't have to leave anyone like Stevie Nicks off of it.

We recently ran across this list of the "Top Ten All-Time Arizona Musicians" from Arizona Premiere Living. Some of the choices are obvious: Meat Puppets, Jimmy Eat World, Jordin Sparks, Gin Blossoms, Alice Cooper, and Linda Ronstadt almost always make the "top" lists of Arizona musicians. We were also pleasantly surprised to see legendary guitarist Duane Eddy on the list.


Mr. Mister: Better than Meat Puppets?

But some of Arizona Premiere Living's choices (and more so, their omissions) baffle us. For example, Mr. Mister is #7 on the list. I've got nothing against the '80s popsters (keyboardist Steve George's mother was my music teacher at Sunnyslope Elementary School), but they only had two hits ("Kyrie" and "Broken Wings") and then disappeared into the ether. So why did they make the list (even ranked above Bill Spooner of The Tubes, Jimmy Eat World, and Meat Puppets)?

Think comic conventions are only for geeks, nerds, and losers? Well, we may not argue with that, but we will argue that being called a "geek" and a "nerd" are no longer derogatory terms. Those guys who picked on Bill Gates for wearing glasses so thick he could see into the future during the '70s are now probably the same guys who fix Gates' plumbing when one of the 18 toilets in his mansion is on the fritz -- if they're lucky.

Be honest: You've had a sip. You know what I'm talking about--you've taken a little tug from that sweet, refreshing Obama Kool-Aid. It's OK -- most of us have. And things will hit a fever pitch today, what with the inauguration and the excitement over you-know-who taking off for pastures more Texan and less Presidential. To commemorate your crush, here are the 5 most ludicris, over-the-top pieces of Obama gear that the most balls-out loyalists should own:

The Phoenix Metro Light Rail has been the talk of the town since voters approved the $1.4 billion project in 2000. The public transit system opened on December 27, and Valley denizens have both praised and bemoaned the rail. The most common complaint is that Light Rail service stops at midnight, but should run later.

 

Here are Ten Reasons Metro Light Rail Needs to Extend Its Hours Until 2 a.m.  

In anticipation of the upcoming live comedy show this Sunday at the Marquee Theatre featuring Adult Swim goofballs Tim & Eric, I feel I must bring to light the magnificent music video directing skills of Eric Wareheim (the nice young fellow on the right).  Wareheim is the more musically inclined of the duo, playing in a handful of bands while living in Philadelphia. He has directed a handful of music videos, infusing his mind-numbing visual aesthetic into songs by Ben Folds and Phantom Planet, to name a few.

The videos are absolutely amazing and they restore my interest in both bands, whom I stopped caring about in 2002. I will feature the videos after the jump, with a brief explanation of why they are both brilliant and absolutely fucking hilarious.

As our readers have pointed out before, "Top 10" lists are subjective. The list that follows is our take on the ten best hip-hop MCs in the Valley. But since there are dozens and dozens of rappers in the PHX, we're sure to leave somebody's favorite out. Heck, we've even got one artist on here that was famous before he ever moved to the Valley. Feel free to kill us in the comments section, after peeking at our choices for...

Phoenix's Top 10 Local Hip-Hop MCs (in no particular order):


photo by Vincent P

1. Roca Dolla: Roca Dolla's been a force in local hip-hop for more than a decade. His label, 5Fith Coast Records, has released albums by some of the Valley's hottest new hip-hop artists, but Roca Dolla's own lyrical flows still bury them all. His latest album, the double-CD Roca Is a Classic, shows his musical diversity, as he raps around old school soul beats, R&B hooks, and sinister-sounding synthesizers.

It's no secret that the guitar is a very sexy instrument. Any guy older than 10 knows that guitars can be chick magnets, and good guitar players are treated like demigods among their peers.

But it's not enough to just own a guitar and be able to eek out the chords for Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven." Six-string slingers are a dime a hundred, but ax men who excel at their craft are a much rarer breed.

Phoenix teems with guitar players, and some of them are actually pretty good. A handful of them are exceptional. Here we offer our take on...

The Valley's Top 10 Local Guitarists (in no particular order):

Happy New Year, Phoenix. Here's one last look at 2008 with the top five blogs as determined by the sheer number of eyes that read them. Catch the top three slots after the jump.

5 - The Nintendo Experience Mobile Tour

I want to be the kind of Nintendo fan that happily shrieks at the chance to play mini games. I wish that I didn't mind waiting three months between releases for another game worth playing. I'd like to embrace casual gaming as a new video game direction, but after visiting the Nintendo Experience Mobile Tour I know that I can not...full story

4 - Local DJ Craven Moorehead parodies the Flobots with "Scottsdale Bars"

It was the politically charged Flobots that took their song "Handlebars" and turned in into a smash hit on alternative radio stations, but it was local 103.9 The Edge DJ Craven Moorehead who turned it into a hyper-local parody that will live on in infamy...full story

With 2008 in the can, it's time to start thinking about what 2009 will bring, musically. The upcoming year is stocked full of highly anticipated albums, not to mention some very impressive debuts. As usual, the early part of the year looks to be leading the way with a throng of solid albums. The following list of 30 albums represents some of the more anticipated albums of 2009, with the month of release noted. Not all of the albums have a release date set or an album name quite yet. Please note that I could not possibly fit all of the albums of 2009 on this list, and some artists with 2009 albums that don't need our help being recognized (U2, Bruce Springsteen) were left off. Click "More" to read our list. -- Michael Lopez

Happy New Year! Up on the Sun and Phoenix New Times have had a lot of lists for you over the past month. Like, more than we can count. Just in case you missed some, here are a few of our favorites:

It wasn't exactly a banner year for proprietors of the record-slinging shops. Album sales at in general were down 14 percent nationwide from 2007, and this obviously hit brick-and-mortar retailers where it counts.

But while folks are increasingly more likely to boot-up CD Baby or iTunes to get their music, local indie record shops are still managing to somehow stay afloat (for now, at least). Personally, I prefer spending what little music money I have at stores like Stinkweeds (pictured) or Hoodlums, both of which are within a short distance to my downtown Phoenix pad.

Not only do I get to fulfill my quota of small-business boosterism, I can also pick up magazines and other music-related ephemera in meatspace instead of cyberspace. (We all have to disconnect from the computer sometime, don't we?) I'm not alone in my feelings, as recent media reports have indicated what I've long suspected: many audiophiles will get their music from mom-and-pop shops instead of big-box stores.

There's also the chance to jaw with fellow music fans, or even the record store owners like Revolver Records' T.J. Jordan, who know more about the music industry then I could ever hope to. (If nothing else, we can also discuss how we're both involved with floundering industries).

It's the season for endless Top 10 lists, but I figured y'all would like to see what said shopkeeps have been digging on over the last 12 months. The lists are as diverse as they are, and run the gamut from soul-shaking blues artists like Taj Mahal to sexy indie wonders like Fleet Foxes (who are mentioned not once, but twice).

Hit the link for the lowdown on their personal faves of 2008.

Show: Kanye West's Glow In The Dark Tour at Jobing.com Arena on June 8

The year was only half over, but I knew this was the best show I'd see back in June. Of course, I never knew how many shows I'd be seeing, employed as feature writer at The East Valley Tribune at the time. Still, Kanye, Lupe, Rihanna and N.E.R.D. kept the lead long after I started seeing three plus shows a week. The bill was great from top to bottom - N.E.R.D. was a disappointment, but not bad, per say - and Kanye's space opera-like set was one of the most ambitious tours ever mounted, and probably the greatest rap tour ever.

My mother, by way of mocking him, once asked if I considered Kanye West "The Voice of My Generation" and, you know what, I kinda do. The ambition, sophistication and imagination of this show demonstrated why. 'Ye also turned in a hell of a performance, carrying his entire set solo, save a cameo by Lupe Fiasco on "Touch The Sky." Not too many performers have done that or could do that. Mr. West showed, live on stage, that he can live up to his hype. --Martin Cizmar

Show: Eartha Kitt with Phoenix Symphony at Symphony Hall, May 31

Some performers are just golden at any age. Eartha Kitt, my favorite Catwoman (from the Batman TV series in the '60s), had more flair onstage at age 81 than most performers half her age could ever hope to have. Kitt, who passed way on Christmas Day, not only provided some extremely entertaining and cheeky between-song banter, but her vocals were strong throughout the show, and she deftly led her band and the Phoenix Symphony through an hour of song standards. A true singer has the ability to rip a page from the American songbook and forever put his or her own distinct stamp on it -- and that's exactly what Kitt did with songs like "Santa Baby," "C'est si bon," "Just an Old Fashioned Girl," and "Uska Dara." Read more about Kitt's stellar performance by clicking the link above. -Niki D'Andrea

By Michael McCall


Photo by Michael Alan Goldberg

Two young blondes with toothy smiles and hard-core work ethics, Taylor Swift and Carrie Underwood, helped country expand its fan base in these years of shrinking music sales. Meanwhile, Kenny Chesney, Rascal Flatts, Alan Jackson, Toby Keith, Tim McGraw, Brad Paisley and George Strait kept filling arenas and at least maintaining their popularity on the road, if not with record sales. But as has often been the case, the best country music has little to do with what's successful in the genre. It's made by those who care more about songs and arrangements than about what the radio is playing or what sparks an arena concert. Country music's strengths come from timeless elements; the same can be said of this list of albums.

By Dan Leroy

A couple of weeks ago, an expert on the Harry Potter series told an audience of high school kids how lucky they were to have this Big Shared Experience--these seven books and 41,000 words in common. What does Harry Potter have to do with hip-hop in 2008? In an age when many year-end lists should be subtitled "Ten More Albums You've Never Heard of and Will Never, Ever Hear," plenty.

Technology has made the world smaller, and in response, we've found smaller and smaller worlds to inhabit. Think of a specific era--in some cases, a specific artist's work from a specific era, or even a specific year--and someone, somewhere is re-creating those very sounds. Which is fine, and sometimes a lot of fun. It's just that those folks who are still striving for the Big Shared Experience were the most interesting stories of the past year in hip-hop. They were the people who believed that hip-pop didn't automatically equal T-Pain, or the real pain of automatic IQ loss.

There were several such moments in 2008.

See the Top 10 after the jump...

And now it's time for the "I love you like a fat kid loves cake" memorial Worst Lyrics of 2008, March Madness-style tournament, this year a terrifying mélange of appalling oral-sex requests, bargain-bin philosophies, grammatical atrocities, and cringe-inducing pillow talk. To elevate the drama, I provided a trusted colleague with the 16 artists who qualified and had him assign seeds--Lil Wayne you expect to go deep into a showdown like this, but Lucinda Williams? Some fantastic match-ups resulted, but in the end, nobody is topping Nickelback's backstage-pass bon mot, as devastating a blow to feminism as Katy Perry and Sarah Palin combined. Oh, for those innocent days of 50 Cent.

Click to see the full "Worst Lyrics of 2008" finals

--Rob Harvilla

By Randall Roberts


You don't need a half-wit music critic to tell you it's been a remarkable year for America, one historians will be discussing and researching for centuries to come. War, financial collapse, politics, technology: All have been dinner-table topics for many Americans. Racial barriers in 2008 were demolished by a Midwestern black man, and gender barriers were hurdled by an Arkansan and an Alaskan.

Democracy has a few awesome new dance moves rolling into the Obama presidency, and it'll be a feast for the wonks to break 'em down. It's for those wonks that we've done some number crunching. When future pointy-headed academics are scouring data in attempts to better understand America in 2008, might it not be instructive to offer a snapshot of a different sort, one that attempts to explain the People and their mindset from a quasistatistical / analytical ethnomusicosociological perspective? 
Specifically, let's address the population in a head and/or heart space it cares deeply about: through its music.

How does it sing and dance? Who does this singing? Who best moves our collective booty and tugs at our heartstrings? I've been crunching Billboard album and singles chart data in order to better understand Who We Are in 2008. I've compiled information on every artist who cracked the Top 10 album chart and the Hot 100 singles chart this year. I've researched each artist and tallied the lot of them based on a number of factors, including gender, ethnicity, nationality, state of origin (if American) and record label. I've then analyzed these numbers. What follows are some conclusions.

(Note to Nate Silver: I'm a lowly music journalist who can add, subtract, multiply, divide, and use a calculator, but not much else. Let this serve as a springboard. Margin of error: 4 percent. Results reflect chart positions up to and including the Dec. 6 issue of Billboard.)


Some of the more well-received albums of 2008 have come from the rainy, bike-loving confines of the Pacific Northwest - a trusty bastion for indie rock and insanely innovative pop. When bands from the two meccas of the Pacific Northwest - Portland, Oregon and Seattle, Washington - emerge onto the national scene, it is hard not to take notice of the region's widespread influence. Five albums, in particular, made all the difference in 2008, cementing the Pacific Northwest's legacy as a musical innovator.